Email Marketing Design – Getting it Just Right

Email Marketing – Why So Many Brands Aren’t Hitting the Mark

Email marketing is an age-old channel which continues to prove its cost effective nature in generating additional sales and helping to maintain customer loyalty. It’s odd that given the popularity of this approach and the sheer volume of emails we send and receive, that brands are still getting the design portion so wrong.

There are two very broad ends of the spectrum when it comes to poor email marketing design.

Budget Email Design

The first is the undercooked, almost looking like a primary school head lice notification email. These lack design, structure and in some cases don’t even stick to a single font. Lack of imagery and the overall compilation will resemble that of a five year old trying to format a word document. The issue is a combination of a lack of design and the text heavy approach. This basic appearance is something modern day digital consumers just aren’t used to. It looks fake and lacks authority, meaning your audience won’t make the connection you need.

Overkill Email Design

The other end of the scale is over design and far, far too much content. It’s not uncommon to receive marketing emails which are structured like miniature websites! Emails are considerably more effective at encouraging the audience to engage with a call to action if the content is concise and focussed. You don’t need to stick a full navigation bar into your email. Give your audience just one or maybe two strong reasons to interact with your email.

Stay on Target

Like any effective communication, it’s best to stick to what you want the audience to do or get out of the messaging. With the limited attention span your audience is going to have for something like an email, you need to be able to convey your intentions and value of the communication almost immediately and without distraction. Treat the content like a landing page and hit the audience with a title that tells them what’s happening. Follow that up with some relevant, concise content and make sure you follow with a prominent and easy to understand call to action.

For example:

• Read more
• Call us
• Buy now
• Book now

Be direct, what was the purpose of your message? Don’t leave room for ambiguity, make it clear, make it obvious, and you’ll get a higher interaction rate with your emails.

If you’re struggling to create or design emails that have an impact, get in touch with us. We create email content, can design your email template and offer fully managed email campaigns. Tell us what you need help with.